6. On 24 September 1999 the Taganrog Town Court convicted the applicant and three other persons of theft of cigarettes from a container in a sea port, an offence provided for by Article 158 § 2 (a) of the Criminal Code. The applicant was sentenced to two years' imprisonment, and released conditionally with six months' parole. The parties did not appeal and the judgment became final seven days later.
7. On an unspecified date the prosecutor of the Rostov Region lodged an application for supervisory review, seeking to have the judgment quashed on the ground that there had been substantial violations of the procedural law by the trial court.
8. On 27 January 2000 the Presidium of the Rostov Regional Court conducted supervisory review proceedings. The prosecutor, but not the applicant or his counsel, was present at the hearing. The Presidium quashed the judgment of 24 September 1999 in the part concerning the applicant on grounds that the trial court had failed to examine and assess the evidence correctly and that its findings were inconsistent with the evidence. These considerations, in the Presidium's view, justified the quashing of the judgment under Article 379 of the Code of Criminal Procedure. The case was remitted for fresh examination by the first-instance court.
9. On 14 February 2000 the Constitutional Court examined another case challenging Article 377 of the Code of Criminal Procedure (see below) and found that provision incompatible with the Constitution in so far as it allowed a supervisory review in a criminal case to the detriment of the acquitted or convicted person.
10. According to the applicant, neither he nor his counsel was informed of the hearing held on 27 January 2000 or of the quashing. He learned about these developments in the case on 13 September 2000, when summoned by the Taganrog Town Court for the fresh examination of his case. Thus, subsequently on an unspecified date the applicant requested the Supreme Court to reverse, by way of supervisory review, the decision of 27 January 2000 in the light of the Constitutional Court's ruling of 14 February 2000. In June 2001 the Deputy President of the Supreme Court informed the applicant that his request was dismissed on the ground that the decision in the applicant's case had been adopted before the Constitutional Court's ruling.
11. The applicant applied to the Constitutional Court requesting that the ruling of 14 February 2000 be extended to his case. On 21 December 2001 the Constitutional Court refused to examine the applicant's complaint as its subject matter was identical to that of the case examined on 14 February 2000. It held that the ruling of 14 February 2000 applied to all persons whose cases had been reopened on the basis of Article 377 of the Code of Criminal Procedure, hence the decision of 27 January 2000 could still be reversed in ordinary proceedings.
12. In the meantime, on 27 December 2000 the Taganrog Town Court, composed of one professional and two lay judges, conducted a fresh examination of the criminal case against the applicant. He was found guilty of theft and convicted under Article 158 § 2 (а) and (c) of the Criminal Code, and given a conditional sentence of two years and six months' imprisonment with six months' parole. With reference to the Amnesty Act of 26 May 2000 the court ordered that the applicant in any event be relieved from serving his sentence. The parties did not appeal and the judgment became final seven days later.
13. On 5 November 2003 the prosecutor of the Rostov Region lodged an application for supervisory review, requesting the Presidium of the Rostov Regional Court to amend the judgment of 27 December 2000 by reclassifying the applicant's actions under Article 158 § 2 (a) of the Criminal Code, and to reduce the sentence to a year and a half of conditional imprisonment. According to the Gove
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